Betafo, a rural community in central Madagascar, is divided between the descendantsof nobles and descendants of slaves. Anthropologist David Graeber arrived for fieldwork at theheight of tensions attributed to a disastrous communal ordeal two years earlier. As Graeber uncoversthe layers of historical, social, and cultural knowledge required to understand this event, heelaborates a new view of power, inequality, and the political role of narrative. Combiningtheoretical subtlety, a compelling narrative line, and vividly drawn characters, Lost People is asingular contribution to the anthropology of politics and the literature on ethnographicwriting.